New measures of success and achievement subordinated previously strong morals and lifestyles. Increasing factory production, wealth, and income became priorities over religion, education, and politics. Industrialism had, as Hays puts it, “provided for every American an opportunity to participate in great economic achievements and to enjoy a higher standard of living; but it also demanded drastic changes in their lives (3).” Hays accurately realized that when the individual fought industrialism, he also adapted to it, thus creating the revolutionary changes to American society.

The Response to Industrialism 1885-1914 is part of a chronological series of books covering American history from beginning to end. The book itself is organized into four broad topics, along with a separate section on the political happenings of the era. The first topic covers organizational revolution, which studies how the individual is forced to join with each other to cope with a new, impersonal economic environment that threatened an old way of life. Hays use the farmers' battle against high costs and low yields as an example of organizational revolution. Farmers first organized themselves into The Patrons of Husbandry to lead the agrarian protest movement.

The second topic covers reform as a search for individual values. Hays brings attention to both physical values and moral values. Wealth and production permeated the minds of American business owners and resulted in the new urban middle class. Hays uses an excerpt from E.L. Godkin's published in the Nation to describe the reaction felt against the new wealthy class, in which Godkin describes them as a “gaudy stream of bespangled, belaced, and beruffled barbarians (25).” New moral obligations resulted in humanitarian reform, as the Americans of the early 20th century felt guilt for the “necessary element” of society, also known as the urban poor.

The third topic describes the response to the city. Hays explains that industrial unrest and economic hardship further separated agriculture from labor. The farmer ceased to trust the city worker, a potential enemy to a lower tariff. From within the city workers could find factory jobs earning a static wage. The last topic gives the reaction of less developed and more developed areas. Existing cities expanded. People from less developed areas or suburbs could now have jobs in a city without living in the city. The invention of the automobile greatly accelerated this work lifestyle.

Hays's book accurately and in detail describes the variety of ways in which the people of the United States responded to the drastic innovations of industrialism. A variety of books and articles are cited to create plausible explanations. Each chapter covers a topic in thorough detail by further subdividing each chapter into specific sub-categories. Hays achieved his purpose of viewing the populace-progressive era with a full understanding of cause and effect, and not oversimplifying the forces that led to full integration with an industrial society. With an aim to expose these forces, Hays succeeded.

It is conclusive to say that American society interpreted the changes, adjusted to them, and created new ways of living patterns of behavior out of them. However, there are a few factors in which Hays could have delved deeper to further explain the social and cultural changes occurring. The labor movement along with the role of women are either missing or too short a section to provide valid support of his purpose. Both had strong effects on the new industrial society, from building worker-business relationships to the dramatic cultural and political changes brought about by women activists. Hays also takes on the viewpoint of the individual rather than the viewpoint of big business, creating an almost one-sided view on how the individual felt and influenced the full burden of change.

This book is best geared towards the student wanting to greater his or her knowledge of the many changes taking place during the late 19th century and early 20th century. This book had specifically mentioned events discussed in the classroom. One that came to mind was the beginnings of Andrew Carnegie, a farsighted entrepreneur whose steel company helped industrialize railroad transportation. Further in the book, Carnegie is mentioned again when one of his steel plants brought a bloody clash between strikers and Pinkerton detectives, events already familiar from AP history. Overall, Hays's book provides vital views on the individual's effect on industrialism, but is to be used in conjunction with other material for a fair, all-sided view of the industrial era and the changes it brought to the American lifestyle.